Attorney General Gurbir S. Grewal announced that a California man pleaded guilty today to traveling to New Jersey in an attempt to engage in explicit contact with an underage girl.
The defendant had communicated online with a man he believed was offering him an opportunity to engage in explicit contact with a girl, age 11. In reality, that man was an undercover detective of the New Jersey State Police.
Ian Brewer, 25, of Pomona, California, pleaded guilty today to an accusation charging him with second-degree aggravated explicit contact with a minor.
Under the plea agreement, the state will recommend that Brewer be sentenced to seven years in state prison.
He will be required to register as a sex offender under Megan’s Law and will be subject to parole supervision for life.
Brewer began exchanging emails in December 2019 with the undercover detective. The undercover detective said that for a fee, Brewer could engage in explicit contact with the 11-year-old daughter of his girlfriend.
The detective represented that he and his girlfriend were part of a group that met regularly to engage in explicit contact with the child. Brewer agreed to pay a fee of $500 for the weekend to engage in explicit acts with the girl.
He was arrested on January 17, after flying to New Jersey and checking into a hotel room. He was arrested at a restaurant in Elizabeth, where he went to meet the man and his girlfriend. Brewer had $701 cash in his possession, and numerous condoms were found in his hotel room.
“It’s alarming to see the great lengths to which predators like Brewer will go to seek children to exploit,” Attorney General Grewal said. “We want parents and guardians to know that online threats to children from such predators have increased as much as 50 percent in New Jersey during the COVID pandemic, as gauged by tips to law enforcement, and those threats are likely to increase this fall as children return to virtual learning, with less or no in-person teacher supervision of their online activity."
“We want these offenders to know that when they seek out like-minded individuals online, they may instead discover our detectives, with their single-minded goal of protecting children,” Director Veronica Allende of the Division of Criminal Justice said.
Attorney General Grewal and Director Allende urged anyone with information about the distribution of explicit images of minors on the internet – or about suspected improper contact by unknown persons communicating with children via the internet or possible exploitation or abuse of children – to please contact the New Jersey Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force Tipline at 888-648-6007.